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  Published by The Hartwood Publishing Group, LLC,

  Hartwood Publishing, Phoenix, Arizona

  www.hartwoodpublishing.com

  Do-si-do

  Copyright © 2017 by Dorothy A. Bell

  Digital Release: September 2017

  All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination, or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales, or organizations is entirely coincidental.

  Do-si-do by Dorothy A. Bell

  No, Gabriel Buxton didn’t think his brother Van exaggerated in his letter urging Gabe to “get home before all hell breaks loose.” Foolishly, Gabe let slip his plan to go home to his fiancée, Edditha Millican, and his future mother-in-law, Adella. Now he had no way to keep them from discovering the shady past of Hoyt’s Hot Spring, the identity of his nefarious, brutal birth father, and the circumstances of how and where he’d entered this world. But the real threat is Birdie-Alice Bollo, the nuisance from his childhood. All grown up, she could tempt a saint with her luscious body and perky, fiery presence. The plan to conduct a safe and circumspect life with Edditha Millican could be in jeopardy. Yep, this trip home had disaster written all over it.

  Chapter One

  1898

  Gabriel Buxton didn’t understand how the hollow, gnawing feeling in the pit of his stomach could possibly persist after he’d polished off a full course steak dinner, but it did. He’d hoped the savory meal, served in the quiet elegance of the Baker City Geiser Grande Hotel dining room, would provide the cure for the headache tapping away at his temples like a woodpecker’s beak.

  After two long days and one night on the confining, smoke-belching, rattletrap of a train, Gabriel sagged with relief to find himself at last in the relatively blissful quiet and solitude of his hotel room. Dust wafted into the room through his opened window, carrying with it the smells of punky-wood smoke, cigars, beer, and the sounds of an out-of-tune piano. Too tired to move, he sat numb on the edge of his lumpy feather bed, his head in his hands and his elbows digging into his thighs.

  Sleep, he needed sleep. Resigned, he groaned, stood and made his way to the window, intending to close out the noise and stink. However, the air outside, surprisingly cool and crisp, caused him to hesitate. Hands braced on the windowsill, he leaned out, seeking a big breath of the fresh, snow-covered Elkhorn Mountain Range air to fill his lungs. The full moon cast the mountains above the town into a floodlight of deep indigo and milky blue elegance. When he closed his eyes, he could still see the outline of the mountains behind his eyelids, and some of the tension eased out of his shoulders. He tilted his head from side to side, working the kinks out of his neck.

  Abandoning his place at the open window, he turned and blew out the flame in the lamp beside the bed. He disrobed, folded his clothes and placed them neatly on the one and only chair in the room, and then crawled between the highly-bleached sheets. He lay still, mind racing, resigned to spend a sleepless night. Tomorrow, you spineless sap, you’ll have to introduce your fiancée and her mother to Hoyt’s Hot Spring, your home.

  »»•««

  A teasing, cold breeze wafted in through the opened window, and he pulled the comforter up over his head. Chilled, he threw back the cover thinking to jump out of bed to close the window but found the room awash in the faint rays of daylight. Groggy, still disgusted and grappling with the same regrets, he moaned and swung his feet over the side of the bed, dreading the inevitable.

  Upon his instructions, the hotel clerk sent a messenger to the stables the evening before requesting the best equipage and horses the stable could provide be ready and waiting in front of the hotel by seven thirty a.m.

  The hotel had obligingly prepared a large hamper of food and drink, stowed beneath the seat of the buggy, for the journey they were about to embark upon.

  Fully dressed, packed and waiting outside the hotel at a quarter past seven, Gabe had one objective in mind—get out of town before anyone recognized him. If trouble waited for him at the hot spring, it would be best if his return to Baker City remained a secret, at least until he had a chance to discover exactly what kind of trouble he would have to confront.

  He stood at the horses’ heads, keeping his head down to avoid curious passersby. The clerk in the hotel hadn’t acknowledged him as a familiar face, and Gabriel didn’t recognize the clerk.

  He’d grown up here in Baker City—gone to school, watched, and judged. The people of the town never allowed him to forget he had bad blood. They’d waited and watched for any signs of his disreputable sire to sprout up out of him like the horns of the devil—and so did Gabe. Every little misstep, transgression, and lie, he’d gauged and weighed, as had everyone else in Baker City.

  This morning, if anyone should recognize him, he’d have to introduce them to Edditha and her mother, and then Edditha’s curiosity would take off like a runaway stampede. He wouldn’t put it past her mother to wheedle all kinds of information out of some hapless acquaintance—information he planned to dole out in small doses at some point in the distant future.

  He winced. Edditha would find out about him and his family soon enough if things were as bad as his little brother hinted in his brief and cryptic missive, urging Gabriel to get home fast before all hell breaks loose.

  Not that Edditha’s curiosity wasn’t already piqued. She’d smelled a mystery when he’d tried to weasel out of taking her on this trip. He’d tried to forestall her, suggesting they make the hot spring a destination for their honeymoon. But no, it wasn’t good enough. Edditha insisted she meet his family—get acquainted before their wedding. She thought it only right. And besides, she wanted to officially invite his family to their wedding. Gabe protested, presenting excuses as to why his family wouldn’t want to travel to Portland in the middle of the winter.

  Soon Edditha would unearth all the secrets from his past, and maybe she’d change her mind long before the “I do’s.” Gabe didn’t know how he felt about that happenstance. He told himself he loved Edditha, and it would break his heart if she cried off. But there lurked a little voice in the back of his head that whispered it might be for the best; after all, he wasn’t much of a bargain.

  Promptly at half-past seven, Edditha and her mother emerged from the hotel all smiles, Edditha dressed in a blue-green traveling custom with a dainty bouquet of silk lavender-colored hydrangeas pinned to the crown of her green velvet hat, looking fresh as spring. She gave the appearance of a young woman who’d stepped out of a fashionable Portland modesties shop, the color of her costume complimenting her hazel eyes and her dusky blonde hair.

  Edditha was lovely and intelligent and had an air of sophistication about her which both appealed and intimidated Gabriel, which made courting her a challenge he couldn’t resist. She’d welcomed his suit and accepted his proposal without hesitation, which surprised and flattered him. She could’ve had her choice of wealthy suitors far more prominent than he, all with brighter futures.

  After three years, his veterinarian practice had finally gotten off the ground. He’d establishe
d a modest but loyal clientele, managing to keep his head above water. Something about Edditha made him feel inferior, this morning in particular. Dressed for travel, not the city, wearing worn trousers, a stained leather coat over a clean white shirt, and an old Stetson upon his head, he looked like her servant, not her fiancé. But he was home now, and he felt no need to impress anyone with fancy duds.

  At one point during the long night, it occurred to him he could sneak away, leave for the hot spring without the ladies. He could leave a message explaining they would be comfortable in the hotel where they could recoup from the stress of the train while he rode out to his home to prepare his family for their visit. However, at dawn, when it was time to compose the message, he couldn’t do it. Every word sounded like an insult and a pitiful excuse.

  Edditha might be right. Maybe she should take a closer look at what she was about to sign on for.

  Oh, hell—he couldn’t stop Edditha or her mother now. He could see by the sunny smile on Edditha’s rosy lips and the determined nod she gave him before he took her small, gloved hand and helped her into the buggy that he couldn’t stop her.

  “Isn’t it a lovely day, Gabriel? I’ve never seen a sky so blue. And the air…the air is so…so—I don’t know…I can’t explain it, it feels lighter somehow. I slept like a log.”

  “That’s the mountain air for you,” he said under his breath, envious she’d slept soundly. Catching a fleeting glimpse of her smile, he dipped his head in shame for plotting ways to avoid, or at least delay, the inevitable.

  “You’ll have to excuse Edditha, Gabriel,” Edditha’s mother said to him. He took note of Mrs. Millican’s highly fashionable, dove gray traveling costume. Upon her head, she sported a black velvet bowler hat with a snowy-white egret plume tucked in the brim. Gabe ducked to avoid getting poked in the eye as he assisted her up into the buggy. “My daughter’s never been farther east than Hood River. Did I mention I lived here in Baker City for a short time with my parents? We traveled west by wagon train when I was but a child of eight. I remember this country. I tried to describe it to Edditha. I tried to describe how beautiful the mountains are standing on both sides of the valley. This is a treat for me, Gabriel,” she said as she arranged her skirt, tucking it in around her legs. “It’s like coming home.”

  Climbing aboard, and taking the reins, he settled in beside Edditha. Mrs. Millican chortled before saying, “I know, I know, I’ve told you several times, but I had to say it again. This is exciting, this journey, Gabriel.”

  Mrs. Millican was small in stature but not quite plump. Certainly, no one would call her tiny. She was a widow with a permanent, determined twinkle in her gray-green eyes. Gabe tried to smile, reminding himself of his responsibilities as tour guide and protector. When it came down to it, he couldn’t leave them behind or say no to either of them. In truth, he shouldn’t have agreed to their scheme in the first place, but once Mrs. Millican became involved…well, he’d gotten caught up in her enthusiasm.

  A flick of the reins set the horses into motion, and soon they were headed straight east, right into the morning sun, leaving Baker City behind with nothing ahead of them except rolling, brown hills covered in sage, bitter brush, boulders, and grit.

  While the ladies commented on the scenery, Gabe let his mind wander. He’d managed to stay away from his home at Hoyt’s Hot Spring for nearly three-and-a-half years. Sure, he’d missed his brother Van and his sister Josephine—and yes, Buck, his stepfather, his old man. He probably shouldn’t have left home at all, but seeing the pain in Buck’s eyes every day was something Gabe couldn’t take, so he’d left after his mother’s death and hadn’t returned.

  The guilt for choosing to abandon his home at a time of grief and loss had long since been replaced with the challenge of making a living and getting his own life, but with time on the train to do little but reflect, his guilt returned with a vengeance.

  Traveling with Edditha and her mother should’ve worked as a distraction, but the farther east they traveled, the stronger the pull toward his home and all he’d left behind, and therefore the faster the memories sluiced into the forefront of his mind.

  This morning, Edditha chattering away beside him and her mother seated beside her in the buggy, oohing and aahing over every little wildflower and bird, his pangs of unease ballooned out of proportion.

  After they’d stopped for their luncheon and were once again on their way, his anxiety stirred the contents of his belly…one ham sandwich and one generous slice of apple pie…into a small cauldron of burning acid roiling and bubbling into his throat. He dreaded what he might find once he reached his home, but more, now he’d have to come to terms with the grief he’d run away from.

  After settling in Portland, he’d tried writing letters to Buck, to Van, to Jo, but he’d known his unsatisfactory missives were composed of mundane trivialities which revealed nothing of his homesickness, much like the ones he’d written home to his mother and family while attending veterinary school in Boise. Therefore, it had come as no surprise and as a relief that he’d received replies in much the same vein.

  From Jo and her good friend Birdie-Alice, he’d gotten questions. Birdie-Alice Bollo, the daughter of Doreen and retired sheriff Rafe Bollo, spent a lot of time out at the hot spring. Gabe, Jo, and Van, and Buck and his mother, they all considered Birdie-Alice practically one of the family.

  Thinking about Curly-Birdie brought a smile to his lips. The last time he’d seen her, she’d been all dressed up for the Bollo’s barbeque to celebrate her sixteenth birthday. He’d even danced with her. He’d always known Curly-Birdie had a crush on him, but that night, he couldn’t say why—he’d kissed her. He didn’t dare close his eyes, or he’d have to acknowledge his base reaction to her. He could clearly recall the taste of frosting on her lips and the smell of warm, sweet of clover and honey which clung to the girl.

  He’d felt like a cad after indulging in that kiss, knowing Curly-Birdie probably read more into it than he’d intended. But damn, she’d appeared almost a full-grown that night, her baby fat beginning to melt and fade into a womanly figure, the dress showing off her bosoms, indenting for an actual waist and filling out into an enticingly rounded set of hips and a mesmerizing backside which swayed when she walked.

  The Curly-Birdie he remembered and loved from his boyhood was a pest and a neck-or-nothing tomboy. In Jo’s letters Birdie frequently added bits, snippets, and insights into what was really going on.

  Both girls wanted to know what city life was like. Did he go to the theater, was there a big fireworks display on the Fourth of July, what did it look like, were there lots of people there? That sort of thing.

  His brother Van never answered any of Gabriel’s letters. Jo usually added Van said “hey.” That is, until two weeks ago when Gabriel received the letter—well, not a letter exactly, more like a red flag—from Van telling him to get home and get home quick before all hell broke loose. What kind of hell, and what good Gabriel could do once he got home, he didn’t know. But one thing was for sure—Van wasn’t the kind to send up a flare unless it was called for.

  Buck—well, Buck was a good letter writer, and his letters were full of stories, no hint of trouble in them except the usual. A pack of wolves had taken out two old cows over the winter. One morning the steam rose over the hot spring into clouds of mist that appeared as elephants. Then, of course, complaints about the wet springs and the blistering, dusty summers, but never did Buck mention or hint at his broken heart, his loneliness, his day-to-day struggle to keep living, or any kind of trouble he couldn’t handle. But between the lines, Gabe could hear the sorrow, see his father’s tears, read the heartache etched in the lines around his mouth and sad eyes. And now, something threatening loomed on the horizon, something threatening enough to make Van take pen in hand and fire off a shot for help.

  As they rolled along, crossing the high desert with the rugged Blue Mountains behind them and the snowcapped peaks of the Wallowas to their left, Gabe’s f
eelings of dread doubled.

  Straight ahead lay the canyon hidden by the outcropping of basalt which rose up out of the prairie floor. Memories of his childhood, of his beautiful mother, caused Gabe’s throat to constrict and his eyes to burn with unexpected tears. Reminders of Petra were everywhere. The sky was the color of her eyes. The raven flying up out of the scrub brush reminded him of the stories she used to tell him of her mother’s people, the Kootenai.

  He breathed in and squeezed his burning eyes shut and then opened them and straightened his shoulders. Yes, his mother was here, and he missed her sorely. This was her home, and it had been his home. He’d convinced himself he didn’t miss this place, he didn’t need it at all, but this country was in his soul. A tightness closed around his chest like the girth strap on a saddle as he fought to control his emotions, emotions he’d thought long buried.

  They were getting close to the canyon. He didn’t know what he was going to do. He hadn’t considered or thought about the road he’d decided to take, the road that would bring him into the hot spring on the canyon side. He could’ve taken the other road, the main road over to Richland, Halfway, and the Snake River country. Now Gabe realized what he’d done, done without thinking.

  He was about to enter the sacred place, the place where Petra gave birth to him—the place on the east side of the canyon beside a huge granite boulder. As a child, he’d retreated there to think, sulk, plot, and plan, and just plain hide from the world.

  He’d been told the story, over and over, about how his mother, running for her life, seeking shelter and in the throes of labor, had hunkered down behind the big boulder to give birth. Twenty-seven years ago, Buck found Petra there and had taken her to the hot spring where he gave her food and clothes, saving her and her baby, Gabriel, from certain death. The boulder was a special place for Gabe, as it had been for Petra, as it was for Buck.